Venom
by dennalilly
Summary: The Strawhats are ready to enter the Grand Line at last! In the storm of their escape from Loguetown, though, another storm builds within a certain swordsman who is led to believe that he doesn't know everything surrounding the death of a past loved one.
1. Chapter 1: An Old Friend

**_Full Summary:_**

The Strawhat Crew, composed of Luffy, Zoro, Nami, Sanji, and Usopp, after a hasty escape from Loguetown, are finally ready to enter the Grand Line! In the storm of their escape from the island, however, another storm is building within a certain swordsman who, via an old connection from his past, is soon led to believe that he doesn't quite know the whole truth about the death of his only true childhood friend.

**Rating Description:** Rated M (Mature) for mature teens 16 and older. Contains strong but non-excplicit adult themes, strong violence, and strong coarse language.

**Other notes:** Just in case you were wondering, I do not plan on including any lemons, slashes, or pairings. This is Nakamaship only. :]

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><p><em><strong>Venom<strong>_

Chapter 1: An Old Friend

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><p><em>"You'll never have to worry about money problems again when you're working for the Marines! There will always be a job here for you."<em>

_A cheerful, almost childish smile flashed at him, and locks of deep blue hair bounced at the movement of her head, the stark white of the hallway fluorescence casting a rich gleam upon her crown._

Instinctively at the memory, Zoro clenched the stern muscles of his jaw and gripped a strong, wide hand around the woven white cloth handle of the single katana at his waist—Kuina's katana.

_That was just too weird. She looked just like her…_

His dark boots scuffed up loose dust from stones ground smooth by unrelenting travel; his brisk strides kicked up sheer billows of the dust to a generously tanned and dominant brow furrowed in engrossing thought as he moved uneasily through the streets of Loguetown. A collage of pallid stones pressed smooth and densely into the hardened soil passed swiftly beneath his feet as he tossed careless and fleeting glances among the various workshops, stores, and assorted buildings that lined the road. The street, abundant with bustling people, twisted away from the Marine base from which he had just fled.

_…Not to mention she's a swordsman, of all things. What a crazy world._

At least an hour of wandering had passed him. A thin film of dust had coated itself onto his black trousers when Zoro decided to sit down and relax. Comfortably far enough away from the Marine base, he climbed to the top of a flight of cement stairs while gliding a muscular palm up an ornate iron railing. Turning around, sucking in a healthy breath of air and stretching up muscular arms with interlocked fingers, Zoro lowered himself and slumped lazily against the iron railing with a sigh and rested a hand on his knee. A splintered red door hung on rusted hinges on his right, and travelers, merchants, customers, and civilians bustled below on the street to his left. Their voices mixed and intertwined as they floated up into the air towards a gray sky beginning to thicken with clouds. Savory aromas of pastries and freshly baked bread danced about his nostrils along with a raw tang of rain. Relaxing, Zoro closed his eyes and felt the coolness of the concrete perforate his lower half.

_I'll have to find a sword shop before I leave. I'd feel a lot better with three swords again._

The exceptionally vivid as well as relatively new memory of his brief fight with the hawk-eyed warlord of the sea began to flood his mind with flashes of images, of his own splattering blood and a demonically gleaming black sword. For a moment the smell of rain seemed to transform into the iron scent of scarlet body fluid and of cold steel. A quick yet stern shake of his head dissolved the unpleasant images. In their place, to his annoyance, developed the unnervingly familiar face of the female sergeant for whom he should still be rightfully scrubbing floors. He remembered how fragile her feminine body had looked—how delicate… though not nearly as delicate as the angelic ivory smoothness of young Kuina's skin. Gratefully he let his mind float to his only childhood friend, his best friend, and allowed it to remain there, though he did not often do so quite this freely.

_"If you lose, you have to become a member of this dojo."_

The small voice was like the ring of a sweet golden bell in his imagination. The corners of his stern mouth involuntarily curled upwards slightly in remembrance.

_ "You lose!"_

_ Zoro's body was plastered to the slick wooden floor of the dojo. He couldn't make any move at all except comply with the greedy push and pull of his diaphragm as he lay on the floor, breathless, beaten, in front of this girl._

A winding breeze, like a cooling afterthought, caressed Zoro's cheek and then slipped through the wide-open spaces in the chipped iron railing.

_A girl._

_ Damn it._

_Electric blue eyes somehow pinned down his larynx to prevent protest and burned into his skull so that he could not take his own eyes away from her. He had never seen such intensity someone's eyes before. Such… tenacity. None of the other dojo members could even compare. She was in complete control of him. And that made him very uncomfortable._

_The wooden steps at the side of the dojo soon began to welcome him, as his small feet treaded upon their worn surfaces hundreds of times every day. Battle upon battle upon battle, no matter how many sleepless nights he spent vigorously training, far outdoing the other boys, the graceful steps and superior swipes of Kuina's skillful training weapons rendered Zoro breathless and beaten every single time, sprawled and laid out flat in the hot grass of late spring. The heat of summer radiating off the dojo's deep teal shingles dissolved the clouds of the island and painted his body with a rich tan over many weeks._

_She defeated him two thousand times. _Two thousand._ How fascinating was her impenetrable confidence—she radiated confidence. And with good reason._

"_Match over!"_

_Sensei tried to spare Zoro further humiliation._

"_Come now, Kuina."_

_She ignored her father, and pointed her training weapon at Zoro who lay on the floor._

"_It's ten years too early for an amateur like you to use the two-sword style."_

_The words crackled like lightning inside him. _

"What_ did you say?"_

_Kuina almost sneered with pride as she cocked her chin up defiantly._

"_What? We can fight another match if you want!"_

Challenge accepted,_ he thought as he stood, his face and nose stinging and angry red from Kuina's finishing blow. Boldly he defied her proclamation._

"_I _will_ defeat you!" He clenched his small fists in defiance._

_Kuina simply scoffed._

"_That day will never come."_

_Zoro trained relentlessly, for months upon months. Winter passed in a flurry of numbing cold, but he didn't really notice. Through shed sweat and tears he managed to even defeat the adults in the dojo. Boys his age didn't even bother to challenge him anymore. Every once in a while, he would pit himself against a young man named Kane, with whom he was quite equally matched, as he found out._

_Kane was a skillful swordsman, a tall and lean man with dark olive skin and ash blonde hair that was always smoothed back except a few stray pieces, and just brushed his broad shoulders. A smooth, plum-toned diagonal scar adorned his left cheek, expanding from the side of his angular nose to a tapered thread at his prominent jawbone, and his eyes were a cold tone similar to the steel he carried at his side. His moves in battle were strikingly swift and perfectly timed, his strong arms flashing like the glint of the sunlight on his weapon as he fought in the dojo against other adults as well as Sensei. A low, gaunt brow hung above his deep-set eyes, casting dark shadows on his severe face with the exception of the raised shine of his scar, which always seemed to catch the light._

_The man had heard of Zoro's remarkable talent and fierce determination as well as skill, but was still surprised by the extent of these qualities while actually fighting him. Though he had been caught off guard by Zoro's intensity, he never imagined the child would defeat him on the first try because of this. As a result, his pride had been injured in a rather raw fashion, and Zoro never saw him much in the dojo again. Every once in a while though, while the other boys were engaging in various matches, a slight creak from the side steps would alert Zoro to the man's presence, as he sometimes came in for a few minutes to watch the children's matches. Zoro eyed him boldly, and shot fierce glances at him to get his attention, but Kane had always ignored him. _

_Zoro didn't mind others coming in to watch, but this man made him uneasy; even though he had defeated him in a match and thus rendered him to not be a threat, the coldness of Kane's gaze could make him shudder, especially when he saw it directed at Kuina—yes, he often looked at Kuina, and not necessarily with a look of admiration or respect, though to the naked eye, that would appear to be so. But Zoro examined Kane more closely than the others—something about him just made him feel… perturbed. Perhaps it was a look of admiration from those steel eyes, but that admiration, to Zoro at least, seemed to be a wide, suspicious blanket to mask a gaze of contempt that he saw perforating through the man's exterior. It was one thing for Zoro to be frustrated with Kuina's superiority, but Kane had never fought against Kuina, or at least, he had heard no word of any such match between the two. Perhaps even something more was hidden in Kane's glances, but Zoro couldn't really put his finger on it. Whatever it was, for whatever reason, it made his stomach turn._

_Kuina was oblivious. She was too engrossed in the matches going on in front of her as she sat in the dojo with all the young boys, her thin legs crossed and her graceful hands placed upon her thighs, her eyes like ice as she drank in the forms of the fighting boys, identifying all of their mistakes and weaknesses._

_Zoro would fight her again. And _win.

_The 2001__st__ fight—with real swords. He wasn't messing around. _

_The clang of their steel rang out and spun against the dark, sturdy trees in a continuous melodic rhythm. Zoro scraped his two blades threateningly and deliberately across the edge of Kuina's sword so that it emitted a metallic shriek into the night air. She held her ground, her small arms tense. Her petite face was drawn, a serious frown decorated her tiny mouth, and her deadly eyes burned into his._

_He lost._

_Again._

_He burned with frustration, and threatening tears stung his eyes as he sat up in the cool night grass, chest heaving. The night was a vivid blue, and the moon cast a luminous glow upon Kuina's thin but strong shoulders, and glinted a ghostly white incandescence upon the sword held at her side. Her back was to him, and her loose white shirt fluttered in the night breeze._

_And she, his only true goal, began to speak—about how he would, without a doubt, ultimately defeat and surpass her as they grew older. And why? Because of the undeniable differences in their bodies as the matured—because she was a girl._

_Where had all that contemptuous confidence gone? The determination for her _dream?_ It all had seemed to slip away into the bright luminosity of the moon. Zoro was astonished. This wasn't the Kuina he knew._

Because she was a girl.

That's_ why?_

"_My father told me that as a girl, I cannot become a good swordsman. And I know that—it's just… frustrating. _I'm_ the one who should be crying out of frustration, not you."_

No.

"_You're lucky to be a boy, Zoro. If only… If only I had been born a man…"_

_Zoro cried out in protest, his voice wavering, his objection undulating through the moonlight over Kuina's shoulder._

"_Don't you dare whine like that after you beat me!"_

_Kuina took a step to turn and look at him; fresh, angry tears cut rivulets down her flushed cheeks, and they glistened in the moonlight._

"_That's not _fair!_ You're my _goal, _Kuina!"_

"_Zoro—"_

"_Boy this, girl that! Are you going to say that kind of nonsense when I do beat you someday? You're acting like none of it is about _skill!_ You're _insulting_ all my hard training! Do you know how that makes me _feel?_ So don't say that stuff!"_

_Kuina turned to face Zoro, her small hands clenched into white-knuckled fists, and she bit her lip, her chin quivering. She lowered her head and said nothing._

_Zoro strode over to her side deliberately, his feet sifting through the lush grass. He lowered his voice:_

"_Promise me, Kuina…"_

_She released her fists and relaxed her trembling mouth, raising her eyes gradually from her feet to meet Zoro's intense gaze._

"_Someday, Kuina, one of us _will_ become the world's greatest swordsman!" was the gallant proclamation._

_Kuina blinked, tears drying up on her cheeks._

"_We'll compete to see who gets there."_

_Zoro boldly held up an open hand to her for acceptance._

_More tears welled at the corners of her eyes, and she opened her small mouth to speak, but instead turned her head slightly away and towards the ground, and a small smile expanded upon her lips._

"_You dummy…"_

_She joined his warm palm with her own graceful hand. As if in divine approval, a wind swept through the trees, rustling their cerulean leaves, and passed the two children, fluttering their worn clothing and tossing their hair. Crickets tentatively began to sing again. And the children declared in unison:_

"_It's a promise."_

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><p><em>Zoro heard quiet, small steps rustle the grass upon which he was vigorously training. He stopped and looked up, and sweat trickled down the back of his neck. It was the boys from the dojo.<em>

_Immediately he was taken aback by the grave, almost ill looks on their faces. Zoro was hesitant to ask._

"_What do you guys want?"_

_None of the three said a word. They just wore the same severe faces._

"_Guys?"_

_A sparrow, like a declaratory trumpet, sang a song of forewarning._

_Finally the boy on the right spoke, his lips barely moving:_

"_There was an… accident."_

_And another:_

"…_Kuina."_

_Zoro was assailed with a twinge of panic that caused his heart to skip a beat and his stomach to twist._

"_She—she's dead."_

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><p><em>The wind sifted the summer leaves languidly with its gentle poise.<em>

"_She was looking for a sharpening stone in the storehouse… and she fell down the stairs."_

_The rain poured viciously, and dark clouds rumbled in the sky. Propelling feet of the funeral procession splattered the fallen rain._

"_Humans… are fragile."_

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><p><em>The light tenor of the speaker's voice was drowned out by the cruel sputtering alto of the rain.<em>

_Zoro just stared at his feet. Rarely did he look up except to take in the harsh, wavering shine of the black casket._

_Only once did he look away, at that was to watch a quick crackle of lightning impel the waving trees in the distance. _

_However, in front of the trees stood a certain tall young man with steel still at his side, the crown of his ashen hair and the hollowed curves around his dark eyes cast in shadow by a black umbrella. A deep, rose-colored scar stood out boldly from the darkness. The man gazed with drawn features at the harsh black box that held the body of Zoro's best friend, and for just a split second, Zoro thought he saw the right corner of his mouth glide upwards ever so slightly, slickly as oil._

_Zoro blinked, centered his gaze upon his target, and looked at him severely in a double take. Just as briefly as he thought it had been there, it was gone. _

_Was he imagining it?_

_Unable to take his eyes away from the man, Zoro watched as Kane shifted the umbrella to his left hand, while his right languidly smoothed the front of his shirt, gliding his dark, lazy palm from his chest to his stomach and then down his thigh to his side._

_Suddenly he saw the man turn his head, too quickly, in an attempt to meet the child's gaze._

_Zoro's heart skipped a beat and his stomach flipped, but with a great deal of effort he managed to resist the urge to look Kane in the eye, and instead dropped his eyes to the man's shoes. Their thick leather was sprinkled with glittering drops of water._

_Kane's look did not budge._

Please look away.

_Seemingly deliberately, Zoro saw the man shift his weight onto one leg, and in that single movement, that pulled the child's head up to meet Kane's eyes._

_Zoro involuntarily held his breath as Kane brought him into a deadlock. Cold steel burned into him and tied his gut into a knot._

_And the man smiled down at him through the falling rain._

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><p>"<em>Humans… are fragile."<em>

_Sensei wore a blank face, his legs crossed as he was seated upon the newly polished floor of the dojo. His graceful hands—like those of Kuina—rested upon his knees._

_The clang and screeching of metal upon metal sliced through the static in the air._

_Zoro took in exasperated gasps of air whenever he could; even the timing of his breathing was strained as Kuina crashed upon him with her slashes of steel._

_Two swords against one, and all he could do was block._

_He felt his body quickly weakening._

Please, no…

_Kuina knew, and she smiled demonically._

_A long, dark and diagonal scar thrust itself outwards from her pale cheeks, and her eyes were black, not even reflecting the glint in her lethal steel._

_Suddenly he was thrown onto his back, onto the stone angular stairs of the storehouse, knocking the wind out of his lungs in one blow, and he looked up to see a resemblance of Kuina stand atop the flight, and, in one split second, force her blade vertically down into his exposed throat._

With a gasp Zoro was startled awake, instinctively raising his hands up to protect himself, his eyes snapping open to take in a fountain of splattering blood—wait, no, it was—paint upon wood.

"Oh—!" a voice rang out loudly, returning Zoro to reality.

A door had crushed him into the iron railing behind him.

A middle-aged, heavy woman with dramatic lipstick and a stern face quickly stepped out from behind the splintered door. She wore an apron crusted with flour and her hands were dusted with the white wheat product. Beads of sweat decorated her wrinkled brow.

"My goodness, you scared me out of my wits!" She removed a plump hand from her heart.

_Shit, I was dreaming._

Hastily Zoro stood up, his backside numb.

"Uh—I'm really sorry, ma'am, I was just taking a break, sitting on your stairs, and I guess… I guess I ended up falling asleep. I didn't mean to scare you." He scratched his scalp awkwardly and felt his cheeks warm, avoiding her eyes.

The woman let out a relieved sigh. "It's no problem, but I come in and out of here pretty often, so if you don't mind, I'd appreciate it if you rested somewhere else."

"Right, sure." Zoro straightened the sword at his side and left the woman, swiftly descending the stairs into the bustling crowd of the street once again.

_Damn, that scared the hell out of me._ Zoro let out a hint of a chuckle at himself, minor embarrassment pulling up on the corner of his mouth.

He sighed as he neared the base of the stairs where a steady stream of people hummed by. _Now to find that sword shop… but I wonder where the execution platform is, too… no doubt that's where Luffy ran off to. Crazy bastard._

Just as he entered the river of people, someone utterly crashed against his side, nearly knocking him over. Instinctively his hand flexed for his sword.

"Damnit, watch—!" he cursed, but stopped mid-sentence when he saw the darkly clothed man in sunglasses who had spun around to face him.

Zoro opened his mouth, perhaps to say something, but no words came out as he furrowed his brow and looked more closely at the man, who turned his face up into the light.

_Oh, hell no._

A smooth, diagonal scar on his left cheek ran from the side of his nose to the angular bone of his jaw, but now the scar was sunken and carved into his flesh and had faded to white. Ashen blonde hair, now a bit shorter, just grazed the nape of his neck and swung in towards his dark olive-toned face, framing black sunglasses beneath a deep russet-brimmed hat.

_ I must be dreaming again because if I'm not, this is seriously fucked up._

It was no mistake. It was Kane.

The look on Zoro's face must have been ridiculous, because Kane threw back his broad shoulders and burst into hearty tenor laughter at the sight of his reaction.

Quickly Zoro tried desperately to suppress his utter shock, and pulled his mouth into a rigid frown. Tensely gripping the handle of his katana, he shifted his weight onto one leg and waited impatiently for the man to cease.

"So, you did recognize me!" Kane declared between chuckling.

Zoro wasn't amused.

"I figured that was obvious."

"Oh, my," his laughter died down. "Well, it sure has been a long time, hasn't it, Roronoa, old friend?"

Zoro resisted the urge to sneer.

"Yes it has, but I wouldn't go so far as to call as 'old friends.'"

Kane emitted another quiet chuckle and proceeded to lower his head to remove his sunglasses.

"Very well," he responded with a sly smile, removing his dark shades and bringing his eyes up to meet Zoro's gaze. They were just like before—cold and icy and cruel as steel, and they pierced into Zoro with a perturbing intensity. Zoro pictured Kane's unsettling smile at Kuina's funeral and internally compared the two; they were exactly the same. _What a creep._

Zoro swallowed tensely as Kane folded his sunglasses with one elegant hand and slipped them into the pocket of his long leather coat.

"My, I haven't seen you since you were a kid! You sure have grown up," he remarked, eyes drifting knowingly to the sword gripped tightly in Zoro's right hand. "But where are your three swords, _pirate hunter?_" He almost seemed to spit upon the two words as his eyes glinted back up to meet Zoro's nervous gaze.

"I broke them."

"Ah," he responded calculatingly, "still don't know the full extent of your own strength?"

Zoro smirked. "Guess not."

The man mirrored Zoro's expression.

"And just for the record, I never once called myself a pirate hunter. I don't hunt bounty anymore."

"Mm." Kane pursed his lips slightly in acknowledgement, then proceeded to open the left side of his coat, revealing two swords hanging at his hip, one sheathed in an ornate black and silver, and the other in a deep blue. Zoro raised an eyebrow.

"I must mention that I'm quite skilled with the two-sword style now, years later. You could say we're rather similar people."

Zoro scoffed this time, his voice dripping in sarcasm. "Yeah? I'm pretty sure there's still a pretty big difference between you and me when it comes down to it."

Kane smirked again in remembrance. "Is that a challenge, sir?" His cold eyes gleamed dangerously.

Resisting the urge to take him up on that offer, Zoro closed his eyes for a moment and smoothed his features. "No thanks. I'm rather busy at the moment."

"Oh? You didn't look so busy sleeping up there on the stairs."

Zoro's face darkened with growing suspicion. _What in the hell...?_

Kane laughed a bit too vigorously at Zoro's reaction and then emitted a happy sigh.

"Yes, I remember when you used the two-sword style against Kuina," he began, and Zoro's stomach began to twist again just like it used to when he was a child, and Kane continued, "back when I used to watch the kids' matches in the dojo."

He flashed a knowing look at Zoro, but Zoro's features remained stone as he waited for the dark man to continue.

"You were quite the prodigy. But so was that girl you envied so much; you never defeated her once, did you?"

Zoro just stood silently in the street, his gaze developing into a glare as the man emitted a small laugh.

"If I remember correctly, you didn't. She laid you out flat every single time," Kane continued deliberately, his face turning blank, "Sure is a shame, huh? She was destined for greatness despite what her father said. Though she as well as the rest of us wholly valued Sensei's judgment, I don't think she would have let that stop her."

Zoro was becoming very uncomfortable, but resisted the urge to look away.

"I'm sure he didn't mean to trample all over her aspirations like that; as a father, I'm quite certain he had only the best intentions. He's a good man, that Koshiro. It really is a shame—the accident hit him very hard." Kane's tone became blunt, almost purposeful: "But I suppose wherever you go, bad things happen to good people."

Glancing keenly at Zoro, Kane stopped for a deliberately considerable moment to take in his listener's reaction. The muscles of Zoro's jaw clenched with anxiety; Kane's last statement didn't really sound like the well-known cliché; used by this man, it sounded more like… something else. The silence between the two had become agonizing for Zoro, but not for Kane; no, Kane seemed to be reveling in it. Finally the strange man broke the silence:

"Yes, Sensei had a very rough time for a long time, I heard, though you weren't really around very much to see it; you were already completely obsessed with your training and such… and I left the island soon after the accident. I imagine you took the news the hardest, hm? I mean, she was your best friend, right?"

Zoro remained silent for a long moment, and then answered with more uneasiness than he had wished to portray, "Yeah."

"Well good for you; you didn't let that stop you at all, did you?"

Silence.

_Of course not._

Kane was the one to take his eyes away from Zoro to look down to his side at the sheer billows of dust swirling up from the scuffling feet of the people around them. "Really is a shame," he repeated more softly, still grinning.

Another awkward moment of silence passed, and Zoro waited expectantly for the man to continue with this unnerving disrespectful speech. But he did not speak again, and Zoro was desperate for something to break the silence once again as he glanced fleetingly about the street. He cleared his throat.

"Well then… I should probably be going," Zoro said finally in a strained pitch, "I have a few things to do, and then I'm leaving the island."

Kane looked up with a small devilish smile. 'You know, I was serious about that challenge."

Zoro swallowed. "I can't. I won't be back."

The graceful man shifted his weight and placed a hand on his hip leisurely.

"Oh, surely that's not true." A devious glint shone in his eye.

Zoro scowled.

The man broke out into a cheerful laughter once more.

"Alright then, I'll let you go," he replied, "Farewell for now."

Kane stepped to the base of the bakery home to the woman Zoro had disturbed just a few minutes earlier, pulled out his dark sunglasses from his pocket while unfolding them with one hand, pushed them onto his angular face, and with a quick motion, pulled down the russet brim of his hat. He smiled peculiarly at the young man whom he considered to be an 'old friend', turned on his heel, and headed up the street.

Zoro let out a breath he didn't realize he had been holding and relaxed his grip on the white cloth of Kuina's blade.

_Holy shit._

The smooth voice addressed him once more as it became drowned in with the flurry of voices intertwining about the street: "Oh, and I forgot to mention, if you're looking for a sword shop, there's one right there on your left!"

Surprised, Zoro threw a glance to his left, and there it was, a sword shop that hadn't been there before. Looking back right, he watched Kane's lean body grow smaller as the man's graceful strides took him into the distance.

_Thank God._

With a sigh, Zoro turned and headed for the sword shop, pressing his mouth into a tense line.

_This has been one fucked up day. I just can't wait to get out of here._

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><p><strong><em>Author's Note:<em>** So there you have it, the first chapter of my first fanfic ever! :D Don't underestimate me though; I'm a very strong writer. I've just never actually bothered to try and publish anything. Reviews would be graciously appreciated; I want as much feedback at possible! :]


	2. Chapter 2: Precursor to A Storm

_**Author's note: **_Amazingly I finished this whole chapter in _one_ day. But I guess that's probably because I've been working on it relentlessly _all_ day... :P

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><p><em><strong>Venom<strong>_

Chapter 2: Precursor to a Storm

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><p>Thunder clapped and reverberated through the glistening street and collided with the tops of ashen stone buildings darkened to wet, earthen tones, and echoed off back into the dark sky, which assailed Loguetown with a fierce battering of blinding rain.<p>

Zoro internally cursed to himself. _Shit, that was just too close… That damned Luffy always manages to get us in trouble!_

He as well as Sanji and Luffy were soaked to the bone as they darted down the street away from the city's center where Buggy the clown pirate had only minutes ago nearly cut off the eccentric captain's head atop the infamous execution platform. Deep puddles of fallen liquid silver dashed up to spray and sputter the rushing legs of the three pirates, and Luffy, leading the wild escape from their opponents, including his old enemy Alvida, as well as the Marines and the severe Captain Smoker, held a firm grip on his beloved straw hat against the lift of the swelling wind, clutching it vigilantly to his head.

Zoro's panting breath puffed out before him, quickly dissolving into the pouring rain. Once again reunited with his former capacity for Santoryu, he clutched his three swords protectively as he ran.

"Which way is the sea?" he worriedly shouted towards his captain, squinting through the blinding weather, his soaked trousers plastered against the skin of his legs.

Luffy, unlike the two crewmates trailing behind him, was having the time of his life. Between laughs, he replied in the most inappropriately carefree and cheerful manner, "I dunno! The rain makes it hard to tell where we're going!"

_"There_ they are!" Battle cries of Marine men hurrying for the capture of the Strawhats, though muffled through the rain, resounded in the open street and to the targeted pirates before them.

Sanji and Zoro whipped their heads around to see the Marines catching up with them. The cook's golden hair, now matted under the heavy rain, swung up and clutched his flushed cheek at the movement of his head. The excited battle cries grew stronger as they neared the pirates.

"Damn, they're just like roaches!" Zoro remarked to the blonde between strained breaths, "You want to stop and fight them?" The three gold earrings in his left earlobe swung like violent pendulums, their hurried rhythm back and forth rendered to sporadic trembling by colliding with the bone of his jaw.

Sanji emitted a harsh breath, intending to scoff irritably at the swordsman, but to no avail due to his heavy breathing. The blue collar of his pinstriped shirt flapped with the wind. "There's no time for that!"

Suddenly he saw a thin figure up ahead with feet planted severely in the puddles of rain. Sanji's face, rosy from exertion, developed into an open-mouthed smile of awed admiration. It was a tall woman with shining hair of a deep cerulean hue.

"Oh wow!" he exclaimed as they neared the woman, "Who is _that?_"

Zoro looked up and, realizing whom it was, cringed. A rich blue coat with wet fur at the collar and cuffs adorned her feminine figure over a white shirt decorated with multiple wide and circular floral designs of a cherry tint, and it was stained dark with rain and clung to a modest bosom and lightly curved abdomen. Liquid rivulets trickled over the sides of her dark boots, and water dripped in a steady stream from the tips of her dark hair.

It was the female sergeant. Her head was lowered seriously, her face drawn and cast in shadow so that as the pirates approached her, Zoro couldn't see into her eyes. The Strawhats, with the exception of a carefree Luffy, slowed their pace involuntarily as the woman spoke in a dangerously low tone through the rain.

"I didn't know you were Zoro. And a pirate as well."

_Wonderful. Now I have to deal with her_, Zoro thought apprehensively to himself, slowing his pace further, as he recalled his second meeting with the Marine official.

_The sergeant's hair shone brightly under the incandescence of the sword shop lights as she spoke to Zoro._

_ "Well, you're here, so I guess that means you ran away. What a shame; you really don't know how to accept love when it comes your way, do you?"_

_ Zoro just gritted his teeth, his arms crossed protectively across his chest._

_ "And you can have your stupid money back, I don't want it," she continued, pulling his left hand open to slide in the bills he had left for her back at the Marine base. "Besides, look," she remarked happily, pulling rose-toned frames out of her pocket and positioning them upon her face, "I already got some new glasses."_

_ The plum-nosed shop owner had directed him angrily towards the barrels of assorted blades. Irritated, Zoro began looking through them._

"_You must lose a lot of swords if you think you have to carry three of them around," the woman commented, approaching him from behind, her steps resounding on the wooden floor, "unless, of course, you're like that famous pirate hunter."_

_Zoro grinned to himself. "Pirate hunter, yeah," he said in a soft voice with a light touch of sarcasm._

"_He's quite the legend," she continued in an awed voice, "His name is Roronoa."_

_Zoro's grin widened knowingly._

"_Oh, yeah, him."_

"_Yeah, he's known all around the East Blue for his amazing sword skills," and then she tinged her vocal tone with scorn, "but he's not a good person. A swordsman who is just a bounty hunter is no honorable swordsman at all. Everything's backwards. It's really too bad for real swordsmen," she said, looking up to the ceiling thoughtfully. "Pirates and bounty hunters as sword masters? It just doesn't make any… sense."_

_Zoro's smile dissolved and he began to detach himself from her words and brought himself onto one knee, leaning over the far barrel, searching now rather aimlessly through the collection of steel. He kept his eyes low._

"_They have most of the world's legendary swords, too."_

_He stood and stepped closer to the far barrel, involuntarily turning his back completely to her as he leaned over the container._

_The woman closed her eyes and brought her own green-sheathed sword to brush against her cheek almost affectionately. "It's a real tragedy," she repeated sadly._

_Zoro grinned slightly at the resonance of her final words and released the smallest chuckle, attempting to match her sentiment with little success._

"_Uh, I don't know; it's a kind of thing you have to look at on a case-by-case basis, I guess," he responded, partially to gently refute the woman's unknowingly harsh comments, but also, to his mild surprise, to fully convince himself that her words were false—but he couldn't seem to completely succeed. "You never know what people are capable of," he finished, trying to sound distinct, but instead radiated a slight sense of insecurity._

"_This is my Shigure!" she declared, thrusting forth her blade to demand the man's attention, "I'm going to work as hard as I can to perfect my skills and then one day I'll take back all of the legendary swords because the filthy hands that hold them now have no right to wield them!" She lowered her blade. "Yes," she maintained forcefully, "The twelve top Saijo Owazamonos! The twenty-one Owazamonos! As well as the Ryowazamonos! I'll find them _all!_" she finished resolutely, bringing her beloved Shigure in towards the center of her chest in finality._

_Zoro turned to face her at last. "And this one? My sword?" He gripped Kuina's blade with his right hand and pushed the hand guard away with a fluid movement of his thumb to reveal the glint of the steel underneath. "The Wado Ichimonji?"_

_Her gallant justice dissolved at his threatening stance. "Oh, I'm not trying to get the swords back for my sake. I just don't want criminals to have them."_

"You lied." The woman's head rose, a livid glare upon her features. "You're just another _liar!_"

The three pirates stopped completely, the puddles and streams at their feet rippling with continued momentum. Sanji turned around to Zoro with a suspicious glower.

"Aw, great! What the hell did you do to that girl?"

Zoro was getting a bit fed up with all of this. Drawing his mouth into a forceful line and stepping forward powerfully, he brought his hand up to his Captain's shoulder and pushed Luffy out of his way.

"You never asked me what my name was, did you?" he inquired strongly, and stopped ten feet in front of the woman, planting his feet seriously into a puddle of liquid silver. "So I never lied, did I?"

The sergeant took a step forward threateningly and clenched her fists. "You know there's no way I'm going to allow someone like _you_ to leave town with such a legendary sword! _Give_ it to me! The Wado Ichimonji! _Right now!_"

Luffy just watched the situation with his characteristic blank look in the face of growing adversity.

Zoro held Kuina's blade austerely and pulled its sheath, streaming with rainwater, upwards from his side to expose it to the angry woman. With a devious, crooked smile, he challenged her:

"Come and get it." He released a humorous scoff of air from his lungs as he expectantly awaited the sergeant's reaction.

In the response Zoro desired from her, the woman lowered her head and growled with clenched teeth, bent her knees while leaning forward, and drew her sword up and out from its green-tinged sheath, a crackle of lightning glinting blue in its steel. Swiping upwards, she emitted a battle cry and lunged forward.

Their swords clashed together crossways, each holding their own with eyes burning into the other. The woman inhaled a sharp breath before forcing a sidewise and downward cut to push away the Wado Ichimonji, whose wielder leapt backwards gracefully, kicking up a splash of dark rainwater and swinging his arm around before bringing his blade vertically down onto the woman's horizontal steel. His face radiated resolve as he furrowed his brow. Thinking, a devious grin spread upon the swordsman's lips.

_Okay then…_

Experimentally he applied a greater amount of force to his weapon, leaning in to his opponent harshly.

The woman grunted at she was forced to match Zoro's level of exertion. She tightened her jaw and bared her teeth as the rain poured.

Sanji curled his lean hands into fists, offended by his crewmate's brutality. "What a jerk! You can't fight a girl!"

"I can handle myself!" was the sergeant's resounding outcry, rancid with offense. Sanji was taken aback somewhat.

"This is a fight between the two of us! I don't need help, so _back off!_" she insisted ferociously, not just to the blonde cook, but to anyone else who dared to interfere.

The heavy rain plastered Zoro's shirt onto the prominent muscles of his back, revealing generously tanned skin beneath the translucent white cloth. He called to Sanji in a low tone over his shoulder.

"You heard her. Get out of here."

Sanji grimaced worriedly, but Luffy smiled widely. "Let's go!" his cheerful, gravelly voice rang out to the cook. Clutching his hat, he left Sanji's side and hurried past the battling individuals.

Sanji followed reluctantly. Turning as he trailed behind his eccentric captain, he called a warning back to the swordsman: "Hey, Zoro, if you hurt her, I'm gonna kick your ass!" He continued down the stone street to follow Luffy.

Both swordsmen held their stances, weapons crossed against each other as the trickling streams of rain intertwined on the small point at which their steel joined. The sergeant's open jacket flapped in the vicious wind, revealing a plum-toned lining above slender hips. Her bulky gloves of gray suede folded and crinkled tensely above the tight grip she held upon the handle of her katana.

Behind them, Zoro heard the cries of the Marines that had been relentlessly following him.

"Tashigi's got one!"

_So that's her name._

Tashigi struggled to hold her own, but Zoro no longer wore a cunning smile in response to her strain. Removing his left hand atop his other upon his sword's handle, he reached down to his right hip to draw his brand new Yubashiri from its black lacquer sheath. Tashigi's eyes widened as the swordsman pulled the blade crisply out and clashed it diagonally against her Shigure to join his other Wazamono.

He wasn't going to play around anymore. With a whipping slash he brought the Yubashiri down for Tashigi to block, a precursor to his next move in which he used his Ichimonji. The sergeant leapt out of the way as the man's steel bit into the ground where she had been standing.

Zoro began to overpower the woman as he threw forth momentous slashes with both blades over and over again, against which the Marine could only defend. Out of the corner of his eye, Zoro noted the stone, gritty building close behind Tashigi, stopped for one moment, listening to her panting breath, and then in one fluid yet powerful movement, brought both his blades down one final time, throwing the woman viciously against the stone wall. She emitted a stunned cry at the blow of the hard stone against her curved back, and Zoro used that split second of surprise to slice his right arm upwards gracefully, locking the hand guard of Tashigi's Shigure with the angular guard of his own Yubashiri, pulling swiftly, and slipping the handle of her katana out of her grasp, sending it soaring through the rain.

Tashigi saw the glint of Yubashiri's steel in Zoro's cold eye, and slumped, paralyzed against the wall. He raised the prized Wado Ichimonji high into the pelting rain, and the female sergeant inhaled sharply in a terrified gasp as Zoro propelled his weapon toward her face, just missing her left cheek and biting into the wall behind her.

The woman did not breathe as the clang of her Shigure against the ground fifteen feet away rang out and echoed between the buildings of the street.

Tentatively Tashigi took in a few small gasps, finally able to take her eyes off those of the swordsman and glance at her horrified reflection in Zoro's steel. And Zoro smiled smugly at her, almost demonically as their eyes met, watching her pupils contracting inside deep brown irises. _The look of frightened prey_, Zoro thought, the observation in which his chest began to swell with pride as he reveled in his victory.

Lightning flashed, followed immediately by a nearly deafening clap of thunder.

"I hate to disappoint, but you will _never_ get this sword from me."

Taking a second to drink in the finality of the triumphant moment, Zoro then swiftly pulled his Wado Ichimonji out from the wall, and, stepping away from his helpless, defeated opponent, and twirled the handle about his skillful fingers before sheathing both Kuina's blade and his Yubashiri at his hip.

The sergeant's Marines had been watching in awe, standing about awkwardly, unsure of what to do.

"I can't believe… Tashigi lost."

"I've never seen her lose before."

Zoro met the woman's eyes again forcefully.

"Now, I think it's time for me to go," his voice resounded with an icy conclusiveness. Turning on his heel, he began to walk away.

Tashigi's voice rang out between gasping breaths:

"Why didn't you kill me?" she demanded grievously.

Zoro stopped.

"I know! It's 'cause I'm a _girl!_"

Zoro halted his breath. Back turned, he raised his head up into the rain. The memory came flooding back.

_"You're lucky Zoro… being born as a man."_

"It's _pathetic_ that you can't fight me because I'm a woman! It's _embarrassing_!"

Zoro's mouth tensed into a line, and he gritted his teeth.

"You may be physically stronger, but you don't have any guts at all!"

The muscles of the swordsman's arms flexed angrily above his clenched fists. He bore his teeth in a furious grimace, trying desperately to retain his composure.

"This sword isn't just for decoration! I don't think you even know what it means to carry a sword!"

Unwillingly, the green-haired man lost control and emitted an exasperated and furious groan as he whipped around to face the sergeant.

"Would you shut up for _one_ second?"

Tashigi ceased her impertinent rant, as well as her wounded frown, which transformed into a look of utter surprise.

"_Look_," Zoro shouted fiercely, pointing a finger at her, losing all control as his emotions took over and hastened his speech, "You've got the same face of this girl I knew who died a long time ago and before I knew it, you were talking just like her! What I want you to do is stop acting like some dead person you don't even know! And try to be yourself!" His chin was raised as he looked down at Tashigi, trying subconsciously to distance his eyes from her.

After a moment of letting the words of the man's outburst sink in, Tashigi stormed up to Zoro threateningly, causing him to lean back slightly in defense.

"Well, excuse the hell out of me!" she retorted, offended, while Zoro, realizing the stance of his body language, adjusted himself to lean forward into her in an attempt to intimidate her again, and he glowered furiously as she continued. "It's not _my_ fault I sound like your dead girlfriend! I had no idea it was so rude and thoughtless of me to be myself, you jerk! You ever _think_ before you talk?"

Intimidation outright failed this time, as her last comments caught him completely off guard. That was _exactly_ something that Kuina would say.

"_What'd_ you—say?" was all he could manage, his face twisted in horror. He took a step back from her, raising his other arm outwards and turning his wide palm in towards himself as a buffer of subconscious protection.

_Fuck! This is insane!_

* * *

><p>Luffy clutched his hat to his head against the upward wind, smiling broadly with excitement.<p>

"I see the ship!" the captain exclaimed to his cook. "The harbor is up ahead!"

Sanji looked up in response to take in the view of a foggy harbor, in which the Going Merry was being tossed about by the churning waves of the storm. But that's not what arrested his attention; ahead in the street, a figure stood threateningly between the two Strawhats and the harbor, blocking their path.

"Oh great! Now what?"

The shadowy figure in the fog began to develop into a clear image as the two pirates approached it with slowing strides: a large, heavily muscular man stood before them; A stiff white coat framed in dark green fur partially enclosed a thick white torso, garnished with rippling muscles above belted blue jeans tucked into tough, wide boots laced all the way up the man's shins. A proud, stony chest stood out below a jutting chin adorned in thick stubble, and two cigars were clenched between the man's teeth as his white breath snaked out before him. A dark, gruff voice reverberated through the clearing fog as the powerful man looked down contemptuously at the Strawhat captain between his cigars.

"I already told you that you wouldn't be leaving this island without going through _me_ first."

Sanji looked to his captain inquiringly, his brow creased.

Luffy gazed at the Marine captain vacantly as the words sunk in. Then he smiled goofily in realization, emitting a short laugh.

"Oh yeah! I forgot!"

The blonde at his side tensed.

"Sanji, you go on ahead."

* * *

><p>The rhythmic snapping of Marine gunfire echoed off the swelling waves of the harbor. Nami clutched her stuffed shopping bags desperately, and Usopp retained a death-grip upon the huge, clumsy body of Sanji's prized blue tuna. Cannon fire whizzed by and splashed powerfully into the sea at the two crewmates took one final leap from the rock cliff onto the Going Merry. Frantically attempting to regain their footing, enormous waves toppled themselves against the flank of their ship, and Nami collapsed forward onto the slippery wooden deck as the storm tossed the ship like a toy.<p>

She turned her torso frenetically towards the sharpshooter behind her, who had also fallen.

"If we stay here even a minute longer, the Going Merry will be done for!" she called to him through the deafening rain, and she scrambled to her feet.

"What about the rest of them?"

"We'll pick them up _later!_"

As if on cue, a smooth voice called out to Nami and Usopp from the shore:

"Naaammiii!"

Quickly turning her head to look, her soaked red hair gripping the white skin of her throat, she placed her hands upon the smooth iron of the ship's edge.

"Huh—Sanji!"

"Sanji!"

"Wait up, I'm baaaack!" the cook sang, parallel to the ship, hurrying to catch up with the Going Merry, whose speed was dramatically increasing in the current of the violent storm.

"Where are the others?" Nami shouted, cupping her elegant hands around her mouth.

"Agh—who cares, we'll just get them later!"

Nami was assailed with a sense of panic when she noticed Marines gaining ground just behind the blonde cook, cutlasses drawn and pointed dangerously at his lean back.

"Behind you!"

"Look out!"

Glancing behind his shoulder quickly, the cook leaped forward, placing his white hands to the ground and rising into a handstand, and shot a backwards kick into the jaw of a uniformed man. Sanji assaulted the Marines with various brutal kicks beneath the rain, and his opponents fell away one by one. But, like the rhythm of the swelling waves, the persistent men continuously regained their stances despite their injuries.

"Damn it! This is endless!"

Usopp turned to Nami frantically. "We have to get closer!"

Nami didn't look at him, but worriedly gazed upon the battle below as the Going Merry slipped further and further ahead. "But there's no way we can take the ship back against this current!" she protested desperately.

Usoopp cursed and then proceeded to impel himself over the edge of the ship with a grunt.

"Usopp!"

"Bastaaaards!" the sharpshooter cried, splashing into the sea. Upon resurfacing, he fired multiple rounds with his slingshot that met the backs of the men that were closing in on his friend. Upon collision, the men cried out in surprise and pain and collapsed to their knees once again.

Taking advantage of the diversion, Sanji flipped himself over, propelled himself with one hand upon the rocky ground, and delivered a ferocious spinning kick to the bodies of the Marines, knocking the wind from their lungs, rendering them essentially defeated.

"Sanji! Usopp!" Nami cried, failing to arrest the attention of her crewmates.

* * *

><p>"I<em> am<em> going to enter the Grand Line. I _will_ become kind of the pirates!"

The eyes of the Marine captain darkened.

"I'm getting bored. Enough talk," he rasped, and upon outstretching his arms, a curly white smoke sprouted from his limbs, swiftly surrounding the pirate captain's lanky body.

"Whoa—!"

A brief battle had begun in the streets of Loguetown as waves of rain showered the ground.

Having being dropped by the grip of the Marine's mysterious smoke, Luffy lay facedown upon the ground, water streaming past his lips and nostrils.

"Had enough, eh?"

Luffy emitted a pained groan.

In response, Smoker crouched at the pirate's side and gripped the Luffy's head fiercely and shoved it into the ground.

"You're not worth thirty million berries!" he spat.

* * *

><p>Suddenly, the sky bore a green snaking hue, which rapidly expanded and tore its way through the city streets, ripping various pieces of rubble from buildings as well as citizens, pirates, and Marines from their stances. The thick gust thrashed about the entire island for a long, dreadful moment before dissolving into the sky from which it had come.<p>

* * *

><p><em>What in the hell was that?<em>

Zoro reached up to grip a piece of rubble that had been thrown by the vicious wind. Groaning, he rose to his feet and looked around him. The Marines, like he, had fallen, and their bodies lay strewn about the streets.

_Where did Tashigi go?_

Failing to discern any female figure amongst the thick debris, he decided to take this opportunity to escape.

* * *

><p>"<em>Hey!<em>"

Zoro, running alongside his captain, looked up as his ears picked up the navigator's sharp call. The Going Merry was being tossed violently just off the rocky coast, seawater froth from the churning waters gliding up the flanks of the ship and bubbling into the wood of the hull.

Zoro shivered in the rain, and saw Sanji and Usopp within hearing distance on the cliffs; numerous Marines lay sprawled like sleeping dogs at their feet.

"Damn!"

"We gotta go!"

Luffy, upon hearing this, flashed his trademark smile, and immediately developed a quick solution to the crew's predicament within his mind.

"Alright then!" Laughing, he looked around the harbor for a moment, animated as a young child with enthrallment, and then decided upon a sturdy iron railing for his plan. Stretching his rubber arms far into the distance to grip the railing, Zoro, Sanji, and Usopp simultaneously turned their heads reluctantly to see for themselves the essence of Luffy's genius plan. Of course, they wished they hadn't:

"Gum-gum—!" Luffy had heaved his body far into the distance and shot past his own hands upon the iron, and was slowing to airlessness.

_Oh shit._

Zoro's eyes widened in realization; he was the closest his captain, so he would naturally receive the strongest blow. Dreading the hit with which he was so familiar, Zoro turned to run, pumping his arms up and down desperately to gain momentum, but it was too late.

Luffy's elasticity now propelled him towards crewmates; with one hand he clutched his beloved straw hat, and with his other arm stretched himself outwards to grasp the bodies of his friends, against which he collided rather violently.

Within seconds, the reunited crew whizzed through the rain towards the Going Merry, which had turned out to sea. The dashing rain relentlessly stung Zoro's face like needles as they sailed through the stormy sky in the arms of their captain.

Finally colliding with the aft mast, a red and yellow striped sheet that absorbed the shock quite successfully, the bodies of the men rained down heavily upon the deck.

Nami rushed over to greet the entangled forms of her friends.

"You're here!"

She smiled cheerfully, her hair sopping wet and her deep cerulean shirt blackened by the rain.

* * *

><p>"I'm sure he brought the wind with him," the Marine captain remarked mostly to himself as he watched Luffy send his wretched pirates as well as himself flying back to their ship. Smoker's soldiers stood quietly behind him, also watching the pirates escape, with awed looks upon their tanned faces.<p>

"I knew it was him—from the day Gold Roger was executed, he appeared like a brilliant flash of lightning. Then he disappeared. …It's him." Smoker's soldiers turned their glances to the back of their captain's head, confused.

He recalled the recent memory of viewing Luffy lying upon the execution platform, his neck immobilized beneath the clown pirate's boot with a sword held against his neck. And yet, he had heard the pirate proclaim more fiercely than ever:

_"Now listen! I'm the man who'll be kind of the pirates!"_

And he had smiled.

The captain bit down resolutely on his cigars.

"Set sail. We're going after him."

"Sir?"

"We'll enter the Grand Line," he clarified irritably.

A Marine stepped up quickly to protest.

"But, Captain, you can't abandon your post on this island! What would Command say?"

Smoker turned his head to look down on the soldier, stray pieces of his pale hair dripping rain upon his face.

"Tell them I don't care about orders," he snapped harshly, returning his defiant gaze to the sea.

Another voice rang out through the rain:

"I'm coming too!"

"Sargeant major Tashigi!"

The woman stepped up to her captain's side, gripping her reclaimed Shigure. "I _will_ find Roronoa Zoro! I _will_ get revenge!" she declared, gazing up at the misty horizon.

Simultaneously at Loguetown's coast, another pirate ship escaped from the harbor, crowded with rather ridiculously and eccentrically clothed members, as well as a beautiful, slender woman adorned in a wide-brimmed hat and dark, corkscrewing locks of hair, a severe spike-ridden club at her side. They too locked their gazes upon the Strawhat crew.

* * *

><p>"Look! A light!"<p>

The spinning beam atop the guidepost just barely broke through the heavy rain to reach the eyes of the sharpshooter.

"It's a guidepost," explained the navigator. "Somewhere over there is the entrance to the Grand Line."

Usopp clutched the thick pillar of wood upholding the Going Merry's central mast. "Do we have to go in this freaking hurricane?"

Zoro, now recovered from his most recent flight on the Rubber Captain Express, nodded, grinning blissfully.

All of the Strawhat pirates returned his smile.

Luffy, gripping his hat, turned to beam at his dearly loved crew.

The navigator set her eyes upon the ridiculously gleeful features of her captain, threw back her slender shoulders and released a hearty laugh.

The handsome blonde cook was the first to speak through the pleasant silence:

"Okay then! I think we should say something to mark the occasion."

The eyes of the sharpshooter lit up in cheerful agreement. "Right!"

The captain nodded eagerly."Yeah!"

"Let's do it!" chimed in Nami's voice.

Sanji raised a graceful leg and placed his foot upon the circular metal border framing a raised platform in the center of the Merry that was perfect for this symbolic movement.

"I'm going to the Grand Line to find the All Blue."

Luffy joined Sanji's foot with his own, sandaled and wet.

"I'm gonna be kind of the pirates!"

Zoro's heart swelled in satisfaction as his spirits lifted in celebration. He placed his boot upon the metal surface.

"The world's _best_ swordsman," he declared, a full and crooked smile widening across his stern features.

Nami joined in with a slender foot enclosed in a stylish heeled shoe with a small laugh, and her voice resounded like a sweet bell. "I'm going so I can draw a map of the whole world!"

Usopp was last, and a bit uncertain of what to say. "I guess I'm going…" he began, then made up his mind: "to be a brave warrior of the sea!"

The Strawhats all looked down on the five-petal design their feet created… a rather accidental collection of very different people. A wildly diverse assortment of friends, coincidentally brought together in one small place in order to travel the seas together.

Luffy emitted a pleasant and approving giggle as these people came together. "And now, to the _Grand Line!_'

And together, the members of the Strawhat crew raised their feet into the violent sky.

As if in divine acknowledgement, a streak of lightning slashed down through the dark heavens onto the frothing surface of a churning ocean, and a deafening crash of thunder rustled the bones of the crew and echoed through the skeleton of the ship.

And as Zoro replaced his boot upon the soaked wooden floor of the Going Merry, a startling crackling noise from within his drenched green haramaki jostled him from his abnormally gleeful sentiment.

While the Strawhats took their positions aboard the ship to help the navigator maneuver the Merry through the cruel storm, Zoro, now alone at the base of the central mast, reached into his haramaki and tentatively pulled out a wrinkled sheet of paper that had been kept mostly dry by his clothing. He unfolded the paper, cautious not to rip the areas that had soaked up the rain.

The swordsman furrowed his brow with a profound suspicion.

It was a letter.

* * *

><p><strong><em>Author's Note:<em>** Please please, _pretty_ please, if you're enjoying my writing so far, would you just write me a small comment in a review? I'd just like to know your thoughts. Thankies! :P


	3. Chapter 3: Bite of Apprehension

_**Author's note:**_ Yay! No more simply telling what happened in the anime (with a few of my twists to get my plot going, of course)! I mainly did that to take some time to establish the mood of my story and to help remind readers about things that happened before the crew left for the Grand Line. I had to go over some episodes myself just to be sure. Since my story takes place so early in the anime, it won't have any spoilers or confusing details for new watchers. Anyway… now, it's time for my show to begin! :P

* * *

><p><strong>Venom<strong>

Chapter 3: Bite of Apprehension

* * *

><p>Warm peach beams of approaching dusk radiated into the sturdy wood and echoed upon the iron plates of the Going Merry, bursting through her full sails and casting rich shadows behind and beneath her masts. The ship had long since ceased her distressed creaks and cries of the passed ocean storm; now the water sparkled serenely, beaming back at the blissful face of the sun, and wispy rose clouds had trickled into the sky, resting lazily just above the western horizon.<p>

_It's amazing how suddenly the weather on the ocean can change,_ Zoro thought to himself as he passed the lush green whisper of the navigator's prized tangerine patch. He looked far out behind the ship into the eastern lapis expanse. _The water's still as glass now._

The swordsman's liberally muscled arms ached from hours of exertion; during the endless storm, Nami had confined him to an empty room with his beloved old stubborn friend, the rudder shaft. Now the varying and casual voices of his crewmates resounded languidly up from the lowest and central portion of the Merry's deck.

_'Old friend'…_

His mind sparked with remembrance; in the chaos of the storm, he had hastily stuffed that perturbing letter back into his haramaki as he had had no time to look at it, and had nearly forgotten about it entirely. But—as Nami had explained minutes earlier—since the storm had driven the Merry considerably off course, they would not arrive at the base of Reverse Mountain for approximately thirty-six hours, much to the deep dismay of the captain.

Stepping now into the rich blue shade cast by the citrus bushes, Zoro stole a couple sudden glances from both his sides to ascertain that he was alone, and slid a strong hand down the front of his abdomen to retrieve the mysterious sheet of writing. Its previously water-stained splotches had dried and contracted, shriveling its texture like a raisin.

Capturing a deep, raw breath of ocean air, Zoro tentatively unfolded the paper and swallowed before beginning to read its elegantly scripted text.

_"Dearest old neighbor—"_

His eyes widened. _You've got to be kidding me—!_

Zoro locked his eyes into place upon the header, halting his reading, and he raised his brow in a rapid and firm revelation:

Kane wrote this.

_But how in the hell…?_

The swordsman twisted his features into a blend of astonishment and a bit of disgust.

_That bastard… somehow he managed to slip this letter into my clothes._

Lifting his eyes to the watercolors of a pastel sky, Zoro took a moment in silence to mentally prepare himself before looking back down to continue.

"_Dearest old neighbor,"_ and his eyes dropped into the lines of script:

_"I hope this letter has found you in high spirits and good health, as I'm sure you will come to realize that you will need them on your journey."_

Zoro raised an eyebrow.

_"Similarly, I imagine you have come to regard this letter that you are reading with suspicion due to the clever manner in which I have delivered it to you."_

"No shit," the swordsman muttered aloud.

_"Please do not be alarmed, for I bear good intentions only._

_"It has risen to my attention via a variety of informational sources that you are preparing to enter the Grand Line as a pirate to continue your quest to become the 'world's greatest swordsman'—or so you hope."_

Zoro wrinkled his nose in a sneer.

_"However, I must advise you to take a certain circumstance of which you are not yet aware into consideration:_

_"I do not believe you to be fully prepared to leave the East Blue—"_

The swordsman released a mocking breath. _Seriously…? What the fuck?_

_"Your crew is minimal, your ship is feeble—"_

Suddenly a familiarly gravelly and cheerful voice interrupted his focus. Its carefree singsong called out for him thoughtfully as it approached.

"Zo-ro… Zooo-ro! Zoro, Zoro, Zorooo…"

Zoro pressed his lips irritably into a line and attempted to continue.

_"Your crew is minimal, your ship is feeble, and I doubt you yourself are fully equipped either. It would be wise to bring—"_

Luffy's sandals clopped up the stairs and stood to face the sturdy back of the swordsman.

Zoro tried once again.

_"It would be wise to—"_

"Hey, Zoro? Zoro. Zor—!"

"_What?_" he finally gave in, exasperated.

"What's that?"

"A letter," he responded impatiently.

"From who?"

The swordsman ignored his captain, and instead returned to Kane's writing, though he really did not want to read the entirety of what he guaranteed to himself to be a ridiculous ramble of hot air. And he hated the way Kane spoke. It simply sounded ridiculous to him; it reeked of a seemingly sarcastic blend of excessive formality. Even if the part regarding the Strawhats to be rather unequipped in proportion to the summit of their quest was somewhat true, the swordsman honestly didn't care at the moment. So he swiftly scanned through various phrases and lines:

_"…an ocean of forces you do not know… I hold you in the highest regard, Roronoa. You have always been… confident in your perceptive abilities… the time you have left to act upon my written concerns for you…"_

Zoro felt a warm breath upon his neck and out of the corner of his eye noticed an overly curious Luffy, lips pursed with interest, peer over his shoulder at the letter held open between his hands. Uncomfortable with the invasion of his privacy, to which his captain was utterly oblivious, Zoro drank in a few final lines:

_"Be cautious as well as vigilant, Roronoa, particularly… I wish you the best of luck, for on the road you are headed, you will without a doubt need every bit you can get your hands on."_

"From your neighbor?" Luffy inquired artlessly.

Zoro scoffed out loud, both at his captain's question as well as the utter disrespect and mockery within the writing.

_"Best wishes,_

_ "Kane._

_"P.S. I've sent out a small gift…"_

Zoro had had enough. With a disdainful release of trapped air from his harsh lips, the swordsman retracted his hands and impulsively crumpled the letter. Turning to face the aft railing, he flung the paper vehemently over the back of the ship with a sneer of disgust.

"Nooo!" Luffy cried out in protest, scampering to the white railing and stretching out a rubber arm into a lengthy, snaking expanse to seize the plunging letter below, "I wanted to read it!"

The swordsman walked away irritably, descending the stairs, leaving his captain alone on the aft deck.

_What a creep…_ He pictured Kane in his mind._ Can't that bastard just leave me alone?_

The jolly voices of his crewmates resounded into the cooling air as he reached the Merry's middle deck.

"Hey, Zoro!" Usopp greeted him cheerfully, "Sanji's cooking up a big celebratory meal for us!"

"Oh?"

"After a hard day's work, we all deserve a treat!" Nami piped gleefully from her reclining beach lounge, lowering the book she was reading to smile at her crewmate.

The sharpshooter scoffed humorously. "And what 'hard work' did you do, Nami? All you did was order us around while we did all the hard work of steering us through the storm!"

"I _navigated_ us, you moron," she objected bluntly with a sarcastic grin. "Without me, you guys would be utterly helpless."

"Pretty much," Zoro concurred frankly, pulling his three swords out from their resting place at his hip and lowering himself to a sitting position upon the wooden floor and leaning lazily against the thick central pole of the mast. He placed his swords at his side.

Usopp pouted and lowered his gaze back down and resumed tinkering with his slingshot. The navigator smirked and then inhaled deeply, closing her eyes.

"Mmm," she remarked, "that smells delicious."

Zoro turned his head towards the kitchen and caught an aroma that made his mouth water: a mild sweetness of fresh warm lobster and tart tomato puree, with a tinge of blended cooking vegetables.

The cook, alone but busy in the kitchen, heard the compliment echo across the thick surfaces of his shining cookware and smiled humbly to himself. Leaving his pieces of lobster simmer in a silver pan, he finished arranging icy cold and seasoned tuna slices upon a bed of fresh chilled greens, and then swept them up on upon graceful fingers.

All the crewmates looked up as their cook emerged from the open kitchen proudly, and set the appetizer upon a small table he had set out against the flagpole.

"Tuna carpaccio. Enjoy," he presented his handiwork with a wide smile.

Nami and Usopp were the first to stand and made their way excitedly over, until their eyes widened at a familiar sound:

"…Foooooood!" came the animated and joyous cry of the captain as he sprinted down the stairs, a crinkled paper fluttering up and away from his hand, his arm shooting out towards the mast. Yes, Luffy had smelled the food.

The navigator and the sharpshooter snatched two slices each of the delicately sliced meat, and Zoro reached up to take one as well before the captain could reach the plate. The paper Luffy had been holding slipped mutely like a ghost to the foot of the stairs.

Luffy's eyes and open smile widened as his gaze locked upon his target: the colorful dish of sliced tuna.

"It's _meeeeat!_"

Sanji closed his eyes, grinning deeply, his hands in the pockets of his slick black trousers. "It's tuna."

Luffy gripped the central mast and used it as leverage to fling himself over to the table as quickly as possible. Whipping around to face the dish, he scooped up a handful of six slices and shoved them into his mouth.

The navigator smacked her captain's hand as an almost motherly act of discipline.

"Now, Sanji's gone to all this trouble to make us a really fancy dish, and you show him your appreciation by scarfing them down before you can even taste them?"

Sanji threw his lean shoulders back and emitted a hearty laughter.

"Luffy, don't eat all of them! Leave some for the rest of us!" Usopp cried.

The captain looked to his crewmates, cheeks full and his mouth pursed in a pout, mostly in an effort to hold back all the tuna he had stuffed into it.

"But it's so good," he protested, his voice heavily muffled.

Zoro grinned inwardly to himself and took a small bite of the slender pink slice. It was entirely chilled, but its juices flooded his mouth rapidly, brisk flavor bursting into his taste buds.

Luffy turned to his chef expectantly, swallowing about half of the chewed food in his mouth before speaking with a wide smile.

"What's next, Sanji?"

"Don't talk with your mouth full," the swordsman scolded brusquely, as usual.

Sanji was pleased. "Lobster bisque soup, with grilled brie and cherry tomato on garlic bread."

"Ooooooh!" The captain pumped his arms at his sides eagerly, eyes wide with anticipation.

Sanji laughed contentedly, and his blue eyes sparkled. "Alright, I'll get to it, captain." He turned on his heel and walked elegantly back to the kitchen to continue his work.

The sun descended hauntingly below the ocean, the western horizon of the East Blue shimmering back glassy ribbons of white gold into the sky, whose warm painted watercolors had begun to sink down with the approaching night. The blissful voices of the Strawhat crew undulated languidly over the silvery waters as the light of dusk diminished.

The long-nosed marksman of the crew had returned from below deck, a stained glass lantern combined into a wind chime swinging delicately from his dark hand and emitting pleasantly low tones, soft as velvet, into the rich evening air.

"Wow, that's beautiful, Usopp!" smiled the red-haired navigator in awe, "Did you make that?"

"Yep," the sniper affirmed, beaming, "I just finished it a few days ago, before we arrived at Loguetown. It's a set of wind chimes combined into a lantern!"

"Amazing," Nami repeated, setting down the sweet fruity drink Sanji had whipped up especially for her and walking over to her crewmate, "they sound so… soft."

"Can you hold it for a minute?"

"Sure." Nami took his creation into her delicate hands, brushing her fingertips across the hanging pipes in wonder, listening as the velvety tones soothed her senses.

Usopp approached the central mast, and, pulling out a hammer and a thick nail from his back pocket, struck it with skillful movements into the wood. Turning to the navigator, he gestured to her to finish the job. Nami placed the silver chain delicately atop the nail so that the chimes hung perfectly.

Sanji emerged multiple times from the kitchen, bringing dishes of his rich soup, and retreated back again, carrying his crewmates' many empty dishes to the sink. He appeared once more, this time carrying a silver tray of mixed drinks in fancily furrowed and glistening glasses.

"Drinks!" he called to his crew genially.

The celebratory drinks were downed with cheer and the lantern was lit, its warm glow perforating through the richly colored glass and springing forth to echo affectionately upon the wood of the Going Merry and the pleasant faces of the Strawhat crew.

A second round was served as the last of daylight disappeared beneath the horizon, and emerging stars twinkled in a crystal sky.

Zoro requested his usual wooden mug; he didn't need fancy glassware.

Sanji had brought out a small black radio from the kitchen and turned its dial so that its speakers emanated a soft jazz tune.

Luffy, after a few hefty drinks, had retrieved a bulky stack of his navigator's plain white paper from her room, much to Nami's dismay, but another special drink soon diminished her distress, and Luffy folded piece after piece into failed paper airplanes.

Usopp noticed and with slurred speech attempted to show his captain the characteristics of an aesthetic and aerodynamic paper machine, but as expected, Luffy didn't retain any of the information. Instead, the captain experimented with a couple new central and wing folds, and found that it was quite successful.

Soon an all-out battle of paper designs erupted on the deck of the Going Merry, and small airplanes sailed, back and forth across the ship, blue in the night sky. Nami, blushed with the effects of alcohol, had taken to laughing gleefully and cheering them on from her beach lounge, while Sanji and Zoro sat upon the floor facing one another with their own drinks by their sides, content in the company of their crew.

Sanji lit up a cigarette. "So, what do you think of all this, Zoro?"

The swordsman's eyes were closed contentedly, his hands resting lazily behind his head. "Hm?"

"The Grand Line. What do you suppose we'll find when we get there?"

Zoro opened his eyes faintly and smirked. "Water."

The cook emitted a mocking breath. "No shit, dumbass."

Fluttering moths tapped themselves hurriedly against the swirled glass of Usopp's lantern.

The swordsman opened his eyes and looked up to a deep sapphire sky bursting with glittering stars. He thought a moment before speaking.

"I guess I'm ready for anything. It's best to go about that way, mentally preparing yourself for anything that could happen… because anything could happen," he pondered, his voice low and relaxed.

"Yeah," the blonde chef agreed thoughtfully, a wispy white smoke snaking up from his cigarette, "Just look at just the entrance to the Grand Line. 'Reverse Mountain', where water runs _up_ the mountainside! It's crazy! I mean, logically, how could that even work?" he remarked with an awed grin.

Zoro released a short breath. "I dunno. I really don't care about that stuff. The way I see it—those things that exist in the world that just defy all common sense and natural law—if it doesn't hurt you or otherwise hinder your goals, why bother thinking about it?"

Sanji let out a brief, pleasant laugh. "So what's the meaning of life?"

"Don't know, don't care."

At those words, Zoro felt a sharp sting pierce his right cheek briefly and saw a paper airplane, nose crinkled from the blow, fall flat onto the deck upon the sheaths of his swords.

Sanji leaned to his left to drink in the view of Luffy and Usopp's competition. "Huh. They're still going at it?"

"Guess so," Zoro concluded with a slight tint of irritability and picking up the plane with a wide palm, "I just wish they could keep it down a bit."

"_There!_ I won that one for sure!"

"No, you started too fast!" that captain protested.

"When I say 'go', you should already be prepared to release! Watch how I do it!"

"No, you should wait for me."

"But that wouldn't be fair if you had a head start!"

"You already have a head start."

Thoughtfully, the swordsman pulled the nose of the plane straight once again, but then noticed a familiar scripted writing upon the crinkled wing, and was about to crumple the petty machine in his hands until a name in the writing caught his eye:

_Kuina._

His stomach jumped into his throat; he hadn't noticed her name in Kane's letter earlier. He read the words that were visible upon the edge of the plane:

_"Beneath… forces you do… these are the forces… if you do not confront… I hold you in the… sharp one with a bright… our dear Kuina from witnessing…"_

Zoro swallowed tensely, his pulse hastening instinctively.

_"…events you were to return to Shimotsuki… would fully agree… As I am confident in your perceptive… to understand the meaning in my writing… my concerns for you. Be cautious as well as… regarding those who deceive. I wish you the best of luck…"_

Sanji must have noticed the swordsman's pained look; he shot a concerned glance at his friend.

"What's the matter?"

Zoro pressed his lips into a thin line and then crumpled the plane anxiously in his palm, reaching behind his back to slip the paper between himself and the central mast.

"It's nothing."

Sanji wasn't convinced, but didn't press the matter; he respected his crewmate's privacy.

A rather uncomfortable moment passed between the two men, intercepted only by the low, velvety tones of the stained glass chimes and its creator's exasperated cries of competitive forfeit.

"So I _win!_"

Usopp sighed. "Sure, whatever."

Luffy stumbled over to the two men gleefully, his face flushed.

"How about another round, Sanji?" he suggested rather compellingly, an overly wide smile stretching across his face.

"Haven't you had enough yet?"

"Nooooope!" the captain bellowed joyously. "We need to celebrate my _win!_"

A sullen-faced Usopp wandered over to the group.

"…and Usopp needs to drink off his loss." Luffy's knowing grin widened even further.

"I do not!" the marksman cried crossly.

The captain emitted a rich laughter, clutching his abdomen heartily.

The chef stood with a jolly chuckle and headed back into the kitchen to mix another tray of hard drinks for his seemingly already intoxicated crew.

Nami had had enough; her book lay on her lap, her lean legs crossed at the ankles, and she leaned into an elbow placed atop a small table at her side, and her chin rested in the palm of her hand. A petite smile lay across her moist lips, and her eyes were closed contentedly above flushed cheeks.

After laying eyes upon the perturbing words of Kane's letter, the swordsman ended up pouring drink after drink from the tray into his mug; he downed them hastily with a rather detrimental impulsivity.

"Zoooo-ro! Leave some drinks for me!" the captain protested, stumbling against the railing of the ship. "Hey, Usopp… Usopp, look. Zoro's… Zoro drank all my… _dranks_." Upon the word 'dranks', Luffy chortled merrily at his own drunkenness.

Sanji, possibly the only one who wasn't inebriated, had been eyeing the swordsman with concern.

"Take it easy, there," he remarked uneasily as Zoro gulped down the remaining contents of his mug, spilling a bit clumsily over his broad shoulder. "You sure you're okay?"

The man in question released a ragged sigh, slapping his mug down onto the deck. He felt the alcohol warmly tingle down the walls of his throat. He felt his sobriety beginning to slip away into the night.

Looking rather dazedly at the blonde cook's curled eyebrow, he replied with a slur and a bizarre smile, "Yeah, I'm fuckin' peachy, man."

Sanji looked out into the darkening sea awkwardly.

"You know, Sanji," Zoro slurred blissfully, looking the cook directly in the eye, "I ne'er really got the chance t'tell you how much I really like your food."

Sanji turned his glance back to his crewmate and eyed him with a growing suspicion. _Wait… did I just hear correctly?_ _Something's _definitely_ wrong if this guy is complimenting my cooking._

Suddenly, a low gurgling call resounded from the northeast darkness, and a heavy, rhythmic flutter split through the calm of the wind. The navigator lifted a heavy eyelid to look as a carrier pelican emerged from the night, perching upon the railing of the ship. The crew members looked to the service bird with a fair amount of confusion.

Nami stood up from her chair and walked over to the long-faced bird, atop whose feathered breast rested a light harness, and within its frontal pouch, a small package. The bird nodded downwards, using its bill to gesture into the pouch.

The navigator reached in and pulled out the small box, which was enclosed thickly in packing tape. The bird gurgled humbly, lifting his wings as a signal.

"Sure, you can go," Nami replied, "Thank you."

The bird nodded and turned, pattering atop the railing with webbed feet, above which an identification band encircled its leg, and it leaped into the air, flying off into the northeastern darkness from whence it came.

"What's that?" inquired the blonde chef curiously, rising from his seated position to walk over.

"Is it for me?" Luffy asked bluntly.

"It says 'special delivery'," Nami noted. "It's for Zoro."

The crew looked to the swordsman, who looked back at them blankly.

"Huh?"

"Were you expecting a package?"

"No." Zoro furrowed his brow in mild confusion.

Nami walked over to Zoro and handed him the box, thickly coated in tape. It was rather heavy.

The mostly drunken crew watched stupidly as the swordsman attempted drunkenly to open the flaps of the box impossibly beneath the tape. Sanji and Nami, the most conscious of the crew, simultaneously lifted their eyebrows.

"Oh," Zoro murmured in realization, and reached for a sword at his side. Retrieving his Kitetsu, he pulled out its intricately plum-tinted blade from its rosy sheath and dug the tip of its blade into the tape, slicing it clean through.

Irritably he pulled open the flaps, and reached in to grip whatever lay within it, pulling it out and unpacking it, tossing aside the bubble wrap.

It was a sharpening block.

_What in the hell…?_

"What is it?" the cook inquired.

"A sharpening block."

"For your swords?" asked Nami.

Zoro's eyes widened.

_"P.S. I've sent out a small gift…"_

"That's nice," the navigator remarked tentatively, noting Zoro's strange expression, "Who's it fr—"

The swordsman groaned in disgust and hurled the block over the edge of the deck.

"What's wrong?" Nami's voice rose in pitch in accordance with her concern.

Zoro simply stood up abruptly as the steel block splashed violently into the sea, collecting his swords as well as the crumpled paper airplane, and left his crew, ascending the stairs to the rear deck in a ghostly silence.

The crew was quite taken aback despite the drunken stupor of a couple members, and silence echoed across the deck except for the swordsman's receding footsteps and the crackling softness of the jazz tune resonating from the small black radio.

Nami turned to face Sanji, her eyebrows pulled together slightly, hurt.

"What did I do?" she nearly whispered, mild woe invading her voice.

"You didn't do anything wrong, Nami," Sanji assured her calmly, placing a gentle hand upon her shoulder, and added as an afterthought, looking to the stairs, "I don't know what's the matter with him."

Luffy had retrieved the sheet of bubble wrap that Zoro had tossed aside and began popping the small mounds one by one with his fingers.

* * *

><p><em>That fucking bastard!<em> Zoro cursed inwardly, gritting his teeth and pacing aggressively about the aft deck in the cold darkness, returning his swords one by one into the loops in his haramaki. He had, for some fraught and drunken reason he couldn't remember, buried the folded and crumpled letter in the soil at the base of Nami's tangerine bushes so that it was hidden in the dirt.

_ How _dare_ he mock Kuina's death! That sick fucking _bastard!_ I swear, the next time I see him I'll slice him to pieces!_

His heart raced with fury and he heard the pulsing of thick blood through his head, which had begun to ache. He gripped Kuina's blade with a rigid grasp, his knuckles turning white.

Suddenly he stumbled, forgetting how much alcohol he had guzzled down earlier, and fell drunkenly against the railing. _Fuck._

He shot a nervous glance back towards the stairs. _I really hope no one comes up here. I must look awful right now._

Zoro felt bile rise into his throat. _Shit—_

Abruptly he retched, gripping the railing tensely and leaning over to look down upon the churning sea, which didn't help much. Surely enough, his stomach contracted viciously, and he vomited, expelling a great deal of the alcohol he had downed into the ocean. He spat and inhaled a few gasping breaths, looking up miserably into the night sky before vomiting again.

Stomach completely emptied, the swordsman collapsed into a dizzy heap upon the aft deck, sprawled upon the cold wood and gazing up at the stars.

_That bastard just wants to see me suffer because I beat him._

_ …I think._

_ …Maybe?_

Zoro closed his eyes, heavy with exhaustion, and inhaled deeply.

_Or maybe he's just one of these sick fucks who enjoy seeing others in pain and making them squirm._

He listened to the quiet slosh of seawater trailing behind the ships' rudder.

_Probably._

The air was moist and icy cold now, chilling the exposed flesh of Zoro's arms and face, but he didn't care.

_Maybe next time we see that damned pelican, I'll have Usopp shoot it._

He felt the coolness of the night air perforate his eyelids, and he thought of how the deep blue of the night sky was so much like his Kuina's hair.

* * *

><p>Sanji struck a match against its box, and it hissed in ignition, sulfur grazing his nostrils. He held the flame to a fresh cigarette between his teeth, shook it out, and tossed it far down into the sea as he inhaled a deep breath.<p>

_Everyone went to bed finally,_ he thought to himself, _except Zoro of course…_

He turned underneath his fleece blanket to look down on the swordsman from the crow's nest. Zoro's body was plastered to the aft deck, and was still.

_He's been in that same position for the past hour. Hopefully he didn't choke on his own vomit or something._

Sanji picked up the telescope at his side and aimed it at his crewmate. Zoro's mouth was open, and his chest moved slowly up and down, seemingly too sluggishly. His strong palms lay open and his dark bandana was tied around his thick bicep.

Replacing the tool upon the floor at his feet, the blonde cook shivered slightly in the cold and gathered the blanket around his shoulders to caress the stubble of his chin.

_Of course I have to be on watch tonight after all my hard work, _he thought to himself, though not necessarily with resentment. He smiled to himself, remembering the crew's deep appreciation for his work that day. _I sure have found the right crew,_ he mused contentedly.

A good few hours of deep thought passed the cook—thoughts of where he had come from, the Baratie, and all her cooks of whom he was now considerably fond, and the passionate adventures upon which he had embarked with this pirate crew—as he sat atop the Going Merry, periodically retrieving the telescope to scan the edges of the sea for possible ships. Only the peaceful silver of the ocean's surface gazed back at him through the glass.

Suddenly a pained cry from below startled him. Clutching the telescope again, he turned to look down upon the ship.

His eyes fell on the body of Zoro, which had seemed to crumple wearily upon the aft deck. He was clutching his chest, Sanji saw, and his face was twisted in a pained grimace.

Sanji's eyes widened with alarm.

_Is he in pain?_

Rising quickly, the blonde man climbed over the opening of the crow's nest and began to scale down the netted ropes towards the side of the ship, a cold breeze brushing his hair which shone brilliantly in the starlight.

Placing his feet upon the aft deck, he rushed over to his friend, his hurried steps slowing as he neared him.

He was sleeping.

Sanji released a sigh of relief and stepped a bit closer. Zoro's features had softened a bit, and his breathing had returned to normal.

_So I guess he was just having a bad dream?_ The cook guessed to himself. It seemed likely. _Something's really been bothering him lately… something about that letter? What did he do with it?_

Sanji scanned the deck for the crumpled sheet of paper that had caused his friend so much distress, but with no luck. _Maybe he threw it into the ocean like he did with that sharpening block…_

The blonde inhaled deeply through his cigarette and leaned against the tall bases of Nami's citrus bushes, relaxing. He looked up to the night sky thoughtfully, his hands in his pockets.

_Come to think of it, why would he do that? He doesn't have one of his own. Why not keep it? It would come in handy from time to time._

The chef exhaled a huff of smoke that wisped across the far railing of the Going Merry.

_Unless it was from someone he considers an enemy… but why would an enemy send him a gift?_

Another pained cry from the swordsman made him jump and drop his cigarette from between his teeth, its ashes sparking upon collision with the deck.

Sanji held his breath, unsure of what to do as agonizing grunts and groans raked through the silence of the night.

_Damnit!_

The cook strode over and crouched to the swordsman's side, placing a hand on his chilled shoulder.

"Zoro!" he whispered forcefully, wincing in apprehension.

But it was no use. The man simply gripped more tightly at his chest, almost as if he were being stabbed repeatedly, and a cold sweat had broken out upon his forehead, glistening in the starlight.

Suddenly another hand shot up to grip Sanji's wrist powerfully, and the swordsman's face whipped around to face him. The blonde man cried out in surprise.

Sanji tried to tear out of Zoro's death-grip, but it was no use. Desperately he tried to unclasp the man's fingers from around his cuff—until the grip softened on its own.

"…Sanji?"

Zoro's eyes widened in realization; he quickly retracted his hand from his crewmate's arm and rolled away from him, bringing his body up into a sitting position against the railing of the Going Merry, his chest heaving.

"What the _hell_, Sanji!"

The cook had fallen back onto his backside, rubbing his aching wrist.

"_Shit_, Zoro, you scared the living daylights out of me!"

"Speak for yourself! What are you doing up here?" the swordsman demanded, wiping the sweat from his brow hastily with the back of his hand.

"Damnit, you nearly broke my arm."

"Erm, sorry—wait, what am I apologizing for? You're the one who was creeping around up here!"

Sanji struggled with his words. "I was on watch in the crow's nest tonight, since everyone else, including you, was totally plastered, and I thought…" he trailed off.

"You what?"

"I thought you were in trouble," the cook mumbled awkwardly.

"Huh?" Zoro furrowed his brow in confusion.

"Well… you were crying out in your sleep."

The swordsman's features softened, and he was unsure of what to say.

"Oh…uh…sorry about that." He felt his cheeks burn. Embarrassed, he looked away.

Sanji noticed this immediately, and tried to spare his crewmate further humiliation; he knew Zoro was a private individual who highly valued his dignity.

Rising to his feet, the cook bent down retrieve his fallen cigarette and then brushed off his backside.

"Okay, well, I just wanted to make sure you were okay… so I'll just go back up now." He turned hurriedly to leave.

"Wait—"

Sanji turned around to face the swordsman, who had risen to his feet.

"I'll go up."

Surprised, the chef's brow rose.

Noting the cook's expression, Zoro added tentatively while looking down, "I… I won't be able to go back to sleep again anyway."

"Alright," Sanji responded with sensitivity, "I'll go get some shut-eye. Thanks." And he descended the stairs, crossed the middle deck, and disappeared into the ship.

Zoro sighed with relief upon solitude before ascending the netted rope up to the crow's nest. Lingering sweat dried coldly on his face as the ropes creaked under his weight.

_I can't believe I actually cried out in my sleep…_ he thought, the raw warmth of embarrassment spreading further across his cheeks. _And for him to hear me from all the way up here… it must have been loud. Fuck._

The swordsman stepped over the low wall of the crow's nest and took a seat where the cook had rested. The seat was lukewarm. Zoro looked to his feet, at which lay a crumpled blanket—Sanji's blanket; he must have left it there for his friend in the chilly night—and the retractable telescope. Zoro shivered in the cold, which was much more prominent in the high altitude, and began to pull Sanji's blanket over his legs, but tossed it back to its resting place when the familiar stale odor of cigarette smoke grazed his nostrils. Instead, he looked up into the night and tried to rub some warmth into his exposed arms.

Try as he may, the swordsman couldn't keep the images of the deeply disturbing nightmare out of his mind. His features were tense and his eyes were shut as he recalled how the demonic form of a full-grown Kuina with Kane's purple scar and a masculine body had dragged her Wado Ichimonji, embedded deep into Zoro's chest, agonizingly slow to slice open his profound but healing diagonal scar received from Mihawk, blood sputtering upwards into the air. He shuddered as he recalled her small voice as she had leaned into him, remembering the haunting breath upon his face: _"This is how I killed Kuina,"_ and the voice had transformed into that of the olive-skinned, scarred man.

Desperately Zoro shook his head in an attempt to erase the images, but with no luck. Excruciatingly the hours passed like this, and he fervently awaited the return of the sun in the east. Moment after dreary moment crawled by, and the swordsman constantly tossed and turned about his sitting position in the crow's nest, periodically beginning to nod off before snapping himself forcibly awake again. No, he wouldn't let himself fall asleep. Not just because he was on watch, but also because he dreaded the return of that nerve-racking nightmare.

_What time is it?_ He thought to himself, distressed. _I don't know how long I can keep this up._

Reluctantly he submerged himself deeply into thought in order to remain fully awake, or at least as fully as he could manage, and those thoughts, regrettably, brought him to the scarred swordsman whose icy gaze made him shudder.

_Something is wrong with that man,_ Zoro thought severely to himself. _Something is wrong with this whole picture. I know it was just a stupid dream, but… it just seemed so… real…_

Zoro groaned out load into the night, frustrated with his own misery.

_This is all because of that goddamned letter! How could a fucking _letter_ do this to me?_

His thoughts returned to his run-in with Kane back in the bustling streets of Loguetown.

"_Well, it sure has been a long time, hasn't it, Roronoa, old friend?"_

The swordsman curled his lip in disgust.

"_My, I haven't seen you since you were a kid! You sure have grown." _Zoro pictured Kane's eyes lowering to Kuina's blade in a shrewd gaze, and Zoro gripped the sword instinctively in the night at the memory.

"_But where are your three swords,_ pirate hunter_?"_

Zoro inhaled deeply, the cold air rushing into his lungs.

_"Oh? You didn't look so busy sleeping up there on the stairs."_

The man twisted his face with repulsion. _That sick bastard was watching me sleep._

…_Was he _waiting_ so that he could make our meeting look like a coincidence?_

Zoro lowered his brow in thought.

_Then he must have planned to meet me. He must have… he must have been _following _me too!_ He eyes widened in realization.

_But for how long? Since we arrived at Loguetown? Since Arlong Park and Cocoyashi Village?_ He shook his head. _No. He would have tried to contact me._

…_Right?_

Zoro held the cold telescope to his eye and scanned the dark watery expanses in all directions. Looking finally to the eastern horizon again, he was deeply relieved to see the sky lightening into a rich cerulean. Sunrise was approaching. He replaced the telescope upon the floor at his side.

Breathing a heavy sigh of relief, he turned and repositioned himself to face the paling sky.

…_Not necessarily… what if he was just waiting for us to reach Loguetown to renew contact with me? _

_But… why would he do that?_

After a good many minutes of pondering that question, he arrived at no answer.

The swordsman looked out to the paling sky, frustrated, as if it would somehow hold a clue to his questions. The stars rolled over to the western horizon, and the line of the easternmost sea took on a silvery glow as the sky above it gradually acquired a pallid gold hue, reaching up to try and grip the last remaining stars.

The swordsman sat in the cold and thought again of the man's eerie letter.

"_I do not believe you to be fully prepared to leave the East Blue."_

He pursed his lips, considering. Within an instant his mind suggested a concept that until now he hadn't given any thought:

_Does that line have a deeper meaning?_

Zoro straightened his back against the wall of the crow's nest.

_It's like… it's like he doesn't want me to leave. What business could he have with me? It can't be that urgent if he didn't come right out and say it when we ran into each other… _

…_Unless he knew that I would come to realize… _Zoro's eyes widened as he recalled a later phrase in Kane's letter:

"…_to understand the meaning in my writing."_

"Shit!" he cursed out loud in recognition, rising from his seat. _I didn't even read the whole thing!_ And he had mentioned Kuina.

Hastily he kicked the telescope aside and replaced his swords hurriedly into his haramaki. Scaling down the netted rope impulsively, he nearly missed a step in the rush of adrenaline that coursed through him, but caught himself with a firm grip upon the ropes.

Jumping down onto the aft deck, he hurried down the stairs and scoured about frantically for the crumpled paper airplane that encased his letter, pushing aside chairs and tables and whatnot around the deck.

"Damnit, where is it!" he hissed into the silence.

Suddenly he remembered.

Rushing back up to aft deck, he dug his hands vigorously into the soil of Nami's tangerine patch, spilling the dirt upon the deck.

"…_Zoro_?" A feminine voice croaked out.

The swordsman stopped and looked over to see a very bewildered navigator leaning against the wooden railing of the stairs. Her eyes were heavy with sleep.

"What are you doing up?" she inquired groggily, rubbing her eyes, "I heard you moving around the deck. More importantly, what are you doing in my tangerine patch?"

Zoro winced. _Shit._ "Uh… Sanji was on watch last night, but I took over for him."

Nami squinted suspiciously at him, consciousness returning to her fully.

"And _what_ are you doing with my tangerines?" She placed a hand on her slender hip.

"Uh… I was—I was gonna water them," he stuttered idiotically.

The red-haired navigator lifted an eyebrow.

"By _digging them up_?"

The swordsman was at a loss for words.

_Fuck._

Nami closed her eyes in concurrence and turned away. "Well, if you'd like to water them for me, that'd be nice. There's a watering can under the sink in the kitchen." She walked off.

Zoro breathed a sigh of relief. _Why in the hell did I hide the letter here? I must have been seriously plastered._

His hand touched paper in the dirt, and he gripped it purposefully, pulling it up from the soil. Shaking off the dry earth from the crumpled sheet, Zoro pulled it hastily open and unwrapped its crinkled folds. He brushed off the excess dirt from the scripted writing and, turning to towards the sun that was peeking over the edge of the glassy water, began to read the letter in its entirety.

_"Dearest old neighbor," _Zoro swallowed, his heart racing.

_"I hope this letter has found you in high spirits and good health, as I'm sure you will come to realize you are going to need them on your journey. Similarly I imagine you have come to regard this letter that you are reading with suspicion because of the clever manner in which I have delivered it to you. Please do not be alarmed, for I bear god intentions only."_

The swordsman released a shaky breath as he read. The letter had taken on a threatening tone that he hadn't perceived before.

_"It has arisen to my attention via a variety of informational sources that you are preparing to enter the Grand Line as a pirate to continue your quest to become the 'world's greatest swordsman'—or so you hope. However, I must advise you to take a certain circumstance of which you are not yet aware into consideration:"_

Zoro inhaled a deep, ragged breath and took a moment to steady himself before continuing.

_"I do not believe you to be fully prepared to leave the East Blue. You crew is minimal, your ship is feeble, and I doubt you yourself are fully equipped either. It would be wise to bring along extra steel, as well as plenty of medical supplies, for we ambitious swordsmen constantly find ourselves injured from battle. Furthermore, beneath the stairs you must climb to fulfill your ambitions lies an ocean of forces you do not know—forces as sly as the deceptive winds of the ocean. And these are the forces that will, with all due respect, bring about your downfall if you do not confront them."_

Zoro swallowed. Normally he paid no mind to threatening remarks such as these, but coming from this man, the circumstances were entirely different.

_"I hold you in the highest regard, Roronoa. You have always been a sharp one with a bright future. It is a shame that the winds of fate prevented our dear Kuina from witnessing your ascent to greatness."_

The swordsman clenched his teeth.

_"If by some full turn of events you were to return to Shimotsuki Village to ask our Sensei, I'm sure here would fully agree."_

That was it. _He's challenging me. He wants me to return home. He's trying to use Kuina to manipulate me… but something's not right…_

Zoro compressed the crinkled paper beneath his tightening grip.

_"As I am confident in your perceptive abilities, I am sure you will come to understand the meaning in my writing with the time you have left to act on my concerns for you."_

_He's right,_ Zoro realized, his heart pounding with adrenaline. _Once we enter the Grand Line, there'll be no going back._

_ "Be cautious as well as vigilant, Roronoa, particularly regarding those who deceive._

_"I wish you the best of luck, for on the road you're headed, you will without a doubt need every bit you can get your hands on."_

The swordsman involuntarily collapsed to his knees in horror.

This was no longer a matter of this man violating Kuina's honor, he realized; this man was hinting at something much deeper.

_"Best wishes,_

_"Kane._

_"P.S. I've sent out a small gift to be delivered to your ship before it reaches Reverse Mountain. Please accept it and use it wisely."_

Zoro released a forceful breath, aghast with realization.

The swordsman sat alone, his heart tearing within him, upon the aft deck of the Going Merry, the rising sun casting a warm glow upon his twisted face.

_What will I do?_

* * *

><p><em><strong>Author's Note:<strong>_ Mwahaha, cliffhanger! :D Now things really start to get going! Hope you enjoyed! :P Please if you enjoyed my writing, write me a small review! :D I insanely enjoyed writing this chapter. Hmmm... what will Zoro do? Find out next time! Mwahaha! :P


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